Menu

Tag Archives: discouragement

At some point in my Bible college career (earlier rather than later, I think), someone (I no longer remember who) gave me this advice: “Never resign on Monday morning.” What that long-forgotten person meant was that 1) Sunday can be discouraging for ministers and 2) Ministers should not act too quickly on that discouragement. Most times, they shouldn’t act on it at all.

This advice was repeated and reinforced to me many times over the years, both by those ministers (almost always older than I) who simply said it to me verbatim and by those ministers (again, usually older than I) who didn’t follow it themselves, those ministers who let Sunday’s discouragement result in Monday’s premature resignation. It was so common, I thought for sure I’d find some Internet meme about it. I didn’t, but I did find this article from Thom Rainer which alludes to the idea:

This came to mind this Monday morning. I was driving (to an active shooter training session led by our local police department, of all things) and as I drove I was thinking about the discouragement I suffered during yesterday’s service. That service was greatly discouraging for several reasons and, despite what I’ve been taught over the years and how well I was taught it, I was beginning to think of resignation.

As I thought about that, though, three phrases came to mind.

The first phrase was “making it”. As I thought about resignation, I thought, “I’m just not going to make it in ministry.” By make it there, I was referring to becoming what my home church would call “a big name pastor” or “a big man in the brotherhood”. It is a celebrity minister, in other words. We do live in an era of celebrity ministers. I don’t know that we always did. I don’t know that we always didn’t. I don’t know when this thing of celebrity ministers came to be. But I know it is now, and I know we’re living in that era now, and I know that most if not all of my fellow ministers believe that they need to/should be one. I know that most if not all of my fellow ministers believe (whether they will state it directly or not) that they will be a failure if they don’t become one. And I believe that as well. I believe it subconsciously yet still actually. I believe it should happen because I believe I have a message (a way of understanding The Faith) that should be heard by as many people as possible. And I believe it should happen because I’ll be a failure if it doesn’t; that will be proof that I have chosen the wrong path in life. And I’m beginning to believe it is not going to happen. Unlike these people, I have developed the ability to see that I might not “make it”.

The second phrase was “getting through”. As I sat there in my car, I thought, “If I can’t make it, maybe I can just get through it.” That is, maybe I can just get through another twenty or so years of ministry, maybe I can survive long enough to build up a retirement and then get out. That wasn’t the happiest thought I’d ever had. I’ve always felt life had to have some purpose, some goal, some meaning. “Getting through” seems to me to be the opposite of that. “Getting through” seems to be a capitulation to the “fact” that it doesn’t have any of those things, or at least to the fact that those things are never going to be achieved. “Getting through” is just “getting by”, “passing time”, a slow, sad death. It’s like what The Beatles describe in “Eleanor Rigby”:

So those were the first two phrases I hit on: one that seemed positive to me but also seemed unattainable, the other that seemed negative to me but also unavoidable.

But then another phrase came to me. That phrase was “blossom where you’re planted”. I first heard this phrase through a picture that the folks at the church I served while at college gave me when I moved off to start my first ministry.

Or maybe it was “bloom”; I can’t remember and I’ve lost the picture. Either one works.

And it seemed to me that this is more what the Lord is wanting from me, more what He hopes for me and from me. I highly doubt “making it” is as good as it seems. In fact, I highly doubt “making it” has any real place in the Kingdom and the life of faith. It seems much more like a worldly idea to me, no matter what Christian skin we put on it. I equally doubt “getting through” has any real place in the Kingdom and the life of faith. While perhaps humbler, it is worldly in its own way. No, the Lord/Kingdom/life of faith clearly want me to do something more like “blossom” or “bloom”. They clearly want me to produce fruit or be fruitful.

Jesus talked about such fruitfulness at many times in His ministry, and Paul wrote about it often in the Epistles. But perhaps the best reference to it comes from the Parable of the Sower (also called the Parable of the Soils). There Jesus described three people types, all of whom reject or lose the Kingdom seed in some way. Then He described a fourth people type, the type that not only accepts and keeps the Kingdom seed but multiplies it. An interesting thing about that multiplication, though, is that it was never the same. For some it was 30 times, for others 60, for others 100.

There is no indication that the 100 times multipliers were any better or any more right than the 30 or 60 timers. No greater or lesser favor seems to be shown to the multipliers here. It is just the way it is. Some did 100, but some did 30 and some did 60. They all bloomed differently, but they bloomed where they were planted. That’s what the Lord seems to be looking for. Not the quantity of the blooming, but the simple act of it.

That’s an encouraging thought for me. That’s something I can do. It is something I am doing, even though I’m not making it and probably never will make it. It is something I can do which makes getting through so much more than getting through. It is something which keeps me from resigning on Mondays.

Despite the well-known and empirically-proven fact that all Christians are hypocrites (), I am truly bothered (and sometimes bewildered) when I find myself falling into wrong. This is particularly true of wrongs I never thought I’d fall into. Such a wrong is inconsolability.

I’ve seen people be inconsolable in my own time. I’ve seen it and I haven’t like it too much. I’ve seen it in the Bible as well. Perhaps the best example is that of Jacob:

You might say, “Well, you can hardly blame Jacob for being inconsolable at that moment,” and I would agree with you if I weren’t a critical, judgmental Christian (again, ).

Honestly, the fact of the matter is that I’ve never liked such inconsolability, whether it is Jacob’s or some modern person. I’ve always thought it was faithless or melodramatic or who knows what.

Until, that is, I began feeling it myself.

I’ve been inconsolable the past couple days. My inconsolability has been different from Jacob’s. I’ve not told anyone I’m going to mourn until I die. But I have been resisting encouragement lately. Some of that encouragement comes from my mentors; one of my mentors was trying to encourage me yesterday. Some of it comes from God itself; in my reading yesterday, I came across Genesis 8:1 (Then God remembered Noah), which I thought was an encouraging word from the Spirit Himself. In both of those cases my reaction was, “Eh, I don’t want to hear it. I don’t want to believe it.” I knew I should both hear it and believe it, but I didn’t want to. I didn’t want people (or God) to try to encourage me. I didn’t want to be encouraged. I wanted to be inconsolable.

Understandable. Maybe? It’s always understandable when it’s us, isn’t it? But it is still wrong. Yes, this hypocritical, judgmental Christian is admitting he is doing wrong or, perhaps more accurately, has fallen into wrong.

And I don’t know how to handle that wrong, quite frankly. I could say something like, “We should not be inconsolable” or “We must be willing to be encouraged.” Such a something would be true enough, I guess, but I don’t think it would be effective. It’s kind of like telling people to, “Calm down.”

If I had to guess (and I have to here; I’m in uncharted waters, after all), I’d say it might be more effective to remind ourselves who our God is and what His story is. It might be more effective to remember that our God is not only telling a good story with a good ending but is inviting us into that story/ending. I say might. Feelings are feelings, after all. Moods are moods, and getting out of bad ones is a hard thing to do even for the faithful people of God. That is the best I’ve got on this one, though, and honestly I don’t think it is half bad.